Sunday, November 12, 2017

British Tank Production and the War Economy, 1934-1945

All the major
powers of WWII used tanks and especially in North Africa and in Europe they
played an important role in the actual combat operations. Some of these tanks
like the German Tiger were famous for their combat record, while others like
the Soviet T-34 and American M4 Sherman were produced in huge numbers.

However both
during the war and afterwards British tanks were criticized for being inferior.
The design and combat performance of British WWII tanks is a subject that has
received attention by historians and several authors like Correlli
Barnett, David
Fletcher and Peter
Beale are critical of British tanks.

The new book
‘British
Tank Production and the War Economy, 1934-1945’ by Benjamin
Coombs covers the administrative and production history of the British tank
program in WWII and its greatest strength is that it tries to explain why
certain decisions were made and what effects they had regarding production
numbers, tank quality and combat performance.

The book has
the following chapters:

Introduction

1. Government and Industry during
Disarmament and Rearmament

2. Government and Industry during
Wartime

3. General Staff Requirements and
Industrial Capabilities

4. The Tank Workforce and Industrial
Output

5. Overcoming Production Problems and
Delays

6. Influence of North America upon the
British Tank Industry

Conclusion

A great
review is available at amazon.co.uk by user ‘VinceReeves’ so I’ll repeat it here:

‘This is a long-needed objective view
of British tank production during World War II that finally manages to eschew
the hysteria and nonsense that generally attends this subject. Coombs
chronicles the evolution of tank design, and the shifting priorities of
production with authority and objectivity, and demonstrates how much
misunderstanding has attended the controversies over real and perceived quality
issues and inefficient tank production.

Basically, British tank production
underwent three stages during the war; an early stage in which tank production
was downgraded in favour of more vital air defence work, a second stage in
which quality was sacrificed to boost quantity production to rectify numerical
deficiencies, and finally a mature third stage in which quality was emphasised,
and British tanks became more effective and reliable.

Coombs makes sense of what appear to be irrational decisions to continue the
manufacture of obsolete tanks long after they were required - more often than
not this was undertaken to keep production facilities and skilled labour within
the tank programme so that they would be available when newer tanks were ready
for introduction.’

If you are
interested in military history and you want to learn more about the British
tank program then this book is a valuable resource.

For me the
value of the book is that it helps explain German victories in N.Africa in
1941-42. The Germans benefited by fighting against an opponent whose tanks
constantly broke down. In the period 1943-45 the British tanks became more
reliable because a determined effort was made to thoroughly check and fix flaws
and a high priority was assigned to spare parts production.